Wednesday, May 3, 2017

The camp of Vice President Leni Robredo on Wednesday said the impeachment bid against the official is an indicator of immaturity in the country's democracy.

Atty. Barry Gutierrez, legal counsel of Robredo, said impeachment should be intended as a remedy of last resort. But with the critics of the Vice President, the intention came first.

"It''s actually an indicator of a certain level of immaturity in the part of our democracy," Gutierrez told ANC.

"If you just base it on the statement of Atty. Bruce Rivera, he said, 'wanted to impeach her.' So that's when he started looking for evidence."

Atty. Rivera is a member of the group 'Impeach Leni Movement' who submitted an impeachment complaint against the Vice President on Tuesday.

In an interview, Rivera said the vice-president betrayed public trust by sending a video message criticizing the government's war on drugs to the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs.

"When you give a statistic, the first thing you should do is to have basis on the statistic. It's irresponsible for people to be stating, something making it appear that it is alarming," Rivera told ANC.

But Gutierrez believes it was Robredo's duty to point out issues that should be addressed by the government, including the ongoing drug war in the country.

"So many other institutions expressed concern about the ongoing drug war in the Philippines... I think it's part of the Vice President's duty to articulate this and try to urge the government to resolve the issue," he said.

Other reasons why the critics want Robredo impeach include the Vice President's alleged misstating her Meralco shares in her SALN, and her alleged misuse of Pag-IBIG funds when she was chairman of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC).

Atty. Gutierrez already denied these accusations, even calling them "ridiculous." He said said Atty. Rivera's camp is making a case without evidence, "trying to create a case when clearly there is none."

Atty. Rivera, for his, part denied this, saying they found evidence to strengthen their impeachment complaint when they were preparing the papers and doing the legwork and research.